The Baskerville Project

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I was brought up in a household where metal type filled draws that should have stored cutlery; where printers’ ink was kept in the bedroom; paper was stored where clothes should have hung; and printing presses lived in the garage. My earliest recollections are of the smell of printing ink and the clatter of a Vertical Meihle. Printing was my father’s passion and profession and my typographic education came partly through osmosis but to a large degree it was the result of the patient tuition of a father who loved his work as a compositor. It should have been no surprise when at 14 years old I announced that I was going to become a printer. However, my decision was received not with paternal delight but with unease. That which was deemed suitable as a hobby was regarded as inappropriate for a profession. But why this anxiety? It was the early 1970s and the printing industry was in a state of instability: letterpress was finally giving way to offset lithography, metal type was being usurped by photo typesetting and employment opportunities were volatile. However, it was my gender that was seen as the greatest obstacle to entering the printing trade: girls do not become printers!

And yet my adhoc typographic training continued. Hours were spent in the printing workshop and the top of our garden where my fingers froze in the winter and my height was boosted by a wooden platform so I could reach the composing frame. And in that compositor’s case was a fount (note theEnglish spelling, not the recently adopted American version!) of Baskerville: Monotype Baskerville from 6 to 14pt. Beautiful shiny, inky characters, that were wonderful to touch and delicious to smell. Line after line of text would be set, lifted from the stick, placed in the galley and tied with page cord as they waited to be transferred to the chase and secured to the press. It was a transfixing and transforming experience, assembling tiny individual character of beauty into a page of utter delight. So it is with thanks to two Brummies – my father and Baskerville - that I fell in love with the type, started printing for pleasure and began earning my living as a typographer, teacher and writer in the graphic arts. It is a decision I have never regretted.

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